YOUR ONE STOP SHOP FOR REVENUE OPTIMIZATION

What is "betterrevenue"?

Most hotels have the conditions required to benefit from the installation of a revenue management system (RMS) i.e. at least 20 sell out nights per year, peaky demand and the appropriate mix of business. So far, the main reason why hotels have chosen not to install a system to optimise revenue was the perceived lack of available time to dedicate to the training of staff and to the system itself.
Changing the habits of a lifetime in hotels is hard and the lack of time is a reality. For this reason betterrevenue was formed to offer hotels the possibility to outsource the revenue management function while at the same time allowing hotels to benefit from the knowledge of experts in the field.
In order to provide hotels the opportunity to improve the benefit achieved from rooms sales, a two pronged service has been developed:

• Optimization of room revenue during high demand
• Creative ideas to stimulate sales during medium and low demand times

Why offer hotels this service?

During 2003 and 2004 a study was carried out which aimed to increase the use of revenue management in small and medium sized hotels. This study uncovered a need for a assistance in the application revenue management. Please find the highlights below:

Study Phase 1: A new prototype RMS was first installed and tested in a 54 room 3 star hotel and was then improved and successfully installed in two other medium sized 3 and 4 star hotels. A second system ASP type was installed in a fourth hotel but was unsuccessful due to poor demand for rooms at the hotel (no sell-out nights), technological difficulties and inappropriate training and development of all levels of staff.

Study Phase 2: Hotels in a major city were then encouraged to develop revenue management tactics via a new low-tech approach: each hotel was provided with a weekly report detailing the daily forecasted demand for the four months in the future. At the end of a three month trial period, hotels had the option to move towards the installation of a full RMS. Different systems were offered to the hotels including the new prototype and ASP systems. Only one 54 room 3 star hotel went ahead with RMS installation. The reason for the low success rate was due to the fact that hotels had no time to prepare themselves or the hotel adequately. As the hotels could not/would not dedicate the time to attend a one day educational seminar, they only had access to RM education via a low quality online product - some of the participating hotels did not have the technology to access the online learning. Consequently some hotels did not understand how to utilize the reports as had had limited training and a few did not have sufficient demand to warrant the expense of installing a RMS.

Study Phase 3: This phase was fully dedicated to finding creative solutions to stimulate room sales during low demand times in hotels where all of the rooms were rarely sold resulting in high amounts of distressed inventory (especially on weekends).

Final Study Phase: It was noted that most of the participating hotels had the conditions required to benefit from the installation of a RMS. A new support service is offered which provides hotels with the possibility to outsource the revenue management function while at the same time allowing them to benefit from the knowledge of RM experts.